Quentin Durward

Quentin Durward came just over halfway through the Waverley Novels, in 1823, and was Scott's first experiment with a novel set "over the water". It's 1468, and our eponymous hero is a manly young Scotsman of noble ancestry, left orphaned and penniless by the effects of a fine old traditional Scottish blood-feud with a neighbouring clan. He comes to France to enrol with the mercenaries of the King's Scottish Archers, where his uncle is already serving. But he doesn't do his career prospects much good when he falls in love with the beautiful Countess Isabelle, who has inadvertently put herself at the centre of the latest instalment in a long-running power struggle between Louis XI and her guardian, Charles the Bold of Burgundy.

As often show more happens in Scott, the author doesn't seem to find it very easy to work up a further interest in the hero, having once set him up as a sex-god, brave fighting man and figure of impeccable chivalry, so Quentin becomes largely someone that things happen to. The same applies to Isabelle, who is offstage and silent practically all the way through the book, with only one big scene of her own near the end. So the focus of the novel comes to rest more and more on the complex character of Louis XI and the various shady types in his entourage. Louis is portrayed as someone who despises the traditional models of kingly behaviour and is trying to remodel himself as a prototype of the ruthless, cunning Machiavellian ruler (just in time: Machiavelli would be born the following year!). But feudalism isn't quite dead yet, and Scott has a lot of fun with the resulting ideological conflicts. And, of course, his lawyer side comes out in various mentions of abstruse principles of feudal law and custom. So, a bit flat as an adventure story, moderately interesting as a political novel.

As usual, Scott allows himself to move historical events around a bit to suit the convenience of the plot. Conventions have changed in the meantime, and a modern writer wouldn't get away with doing this as blatantly as Scott does, but there's no real deception involved - Scott always explains just how he's cheated in his detailed notes. show less

My first serious reading of an adult classic came about in my twelfth or thirteenth summer. Down on a farm in the hill country of Tennessee, my personal library consisted of maybe ten or twelve titles, plus maybe fifty or so Captain Marvel and Red Ryder comic books. I could go to the county seat every second Saturday — for a haircut, a Saturday double-feature, and a trip to the public library. But I could check out only two books from the library, so that hardly kept me busy for two weeks, especially in the summer if my father had a job that took him off the farm most of the time. Then he was not around to keep me busy hoeing or pulling weeds or hauling manure. So I read everything I could get my hands on: my fathers’ westerns and show more Harold Bell Wright novels, the family King James Bible (I was finally to the stage that I understood what it meant for a man to “know” a woman in the Old Testament and suddenly those stories were considerably more interesting), and books that my older sisters (several years older) had read in high school. That included Shakespearean plays, a series about making movies in Hollywood, and a big, thick novel by Sir Walter Scott called Quentin Durward. That one was my first adult classic.

At that stage of my life, however, I was perfectly capable of transforming an adult classic into a teenage adventure story. All you had to do was skim the expository sections, those long descriptive passages and inserted essays, and skip along to the dialogue and action. Quentin Durward didn’t go as fast as Captain Marvel or even Zane Grey, but it came close. There was a good bit of intrigue; there were several sword fights, a near hanging or two, one long chase, and a culminating battle. And there was a beautiful lady, hiding away from unwelcome suitors in a series of inns, castles, and carriages. She was the beautiful Isabella, “rather above than under fifteen years old,” in other words of marriageable age in the Middle Ages.

For Quentin Durward is one of Sir Walter Scott’s historical novels, sometimes called one of his Waverly novels, but unlike most of them, not set in historic Scotland or England but in medieval France, during the reign of Louis XI. Quentin himself is an impoverished Scots lad, making his way into France to join his irascible.uncle who is a member of the king’s lifeguards, called the Scottish Archers. Nineteen, he is a brash young man, honorable, chivalrous, proud, descended from fifteen generations of Scottish nobility but now without an inheritance. He is also impulsive and subject to immediate loyalties and distrust. And by he way, he happens to be tall, strong, handsome, and brave — with a eye for an attractive young virgin, of course.

So there you have it. All the ingredients a pre-adolescent guy a generation or two ago needed for a full-scale adventure: a hardy lad, an irascible uncle, an innocent lady fleeing unwanted suitors. Of course, this is not a modern novel and Scott was a sensitive, and somewhat sentimental storyteller, but the preadolescent imagination, even in those naive times, could fill in a lot of the gaps.

Of course, the dominant character in the novel is King Louis himself, and the antagonists are his rivals among the nobility and his own courtiers. At least, I realized that upon a recent rereading. Scott’s triumph is in the character of Louis and the perilous times in which he lived. But when I was twelve, or maybe thirteen, he was simply one of the older folks in the background, a darker figure, the object successively of Quentin’s loyalty or distrust, protecting Isabella or betraying Isabella as the political situation demanded. In history, Louis XI was a key figure, reigning for twenty-two years, achieving for the first time the unity of France by overcoming rivals such as the powerful Duke of Burgundy and the Bishop of Liege.

In the first, long expository chapter, called “The Contrast,” the character of these two adversaries is described and the historical situation explained. One paragraph alone prepares one for Louis’s machinations throughout the novel — and historically throughout his reign:

“Brave enough for every useful and political purpose, Louis had not a spark of that romantic valour, or of the pride generally associated with it, which fought on for the point of honor, when the point of utility had been long gained. Calm, crafty, and profoundly attentive to his own interest, he made every sacrifice, both of pride and passion, which could interfere with it. He was careful in disguising his real sentiments and purposes from all who approached him, and frequently used the expression ‘that the king knew not how to reign, who knew not how to dissemble . . . .’ No man of his own, or of any other time, better understood how to avail himself of the frailties of others, and when to avoid giving any advantage by the untimely indulgence of his own.”

Of course, the Duke of Burgundy is as brusque and hasty as Louis is sly and deliberative; and Quentin represents “that romantic valour [and pride], which fought on for the point of honor.” In fact, Scott’s self-stated theme of the novel was his defense of the sense of chivalry that was lost in the later Middle Ages and not retained or regained afterward, except occasionally by a Scots nobleman, usually on the losing side of history. In the first paragraph of his introduction of 1831 (and that paragraph is really all of the introduction you will need to read — at least before you finish the novel), Scott makes himself abundantly clear:

“The scene of this romance is laid in the fifteenth century, when the feudal system, which had been the sinews and nerves of national defence, and the spirit of chivalry, by which, as by a vivifying soul, that system was animated, began to be innovated upon and abandoned by those grosser characters, who centred their sum of happiness in procuring the personal objects on which they had fixed their own exclusive attachment. The same egotism had indeed displayed itself even in more primitive ages; but it was now for the first time openly avowed as a professed principle of action. The spirit of chivalry had in it this point of excellence, that, however overstrained and fantastic many of its doctrines may appear to us, they were all founded on generosity and self-denial, of which, if the earth were deprived, it would be difficult to conceive the existence of virtue among the human race.”

So there you have it in a nutshell (a somewhat verbose nutshell by modern standards). Quentin stood up for my pre-adolescent heartiness and for the sense of generosity and self-denial that the idealist of my old age longs for in our contemporary political scene. But the dominant figures, Scott admitted, then (and now) are motivated by selfishness, egotism, and lust for power. In the novel, Scott lets both Quentin and Louis XI win out in the end: Quentin gets the girl; Louis gets his kingdom. But chivalry, alas, is dead--or dying. Long live the king! And long live the Scottish Archers! show less

A young Scot sets out to find his way to prosperity. He's not a commercial person, so he sees his way foreward is by way of military service. While he suceeds the readers can see that this is by a very rare set of circumstances. Quentin's got nerve, and finds himself useful to Louis XI of France, no one's idea of a good boss. The detail does not rend the fabric of history all that much. This was a reread, so the novel stands up well.

You might think a 19th century novel about a 15th century historical event would be dull, but Scott is known for his adventures, and this historical novel is no exception. It actually reminded me quite a bit of Game of Thrones, with much much much less sex. There is humor, love, fun, fighting, and some rather hateful stereotypes of gypsies. Something for everyone!

[full review here: http://spacebeer.blogspot.com/2012/02/quentin-durward-by-sir-walter-scott.html ]

Probably the only novel by Walter Scott I didn't find long-winded, and the only one I ever read in which he occasionally tried to be humorous - and succeeded.

One of the few Sir Walter Scott Novels that takes place outside of Scotland although the main character and his uncle are from Scotland. None the less it is well worth the reading and extremely enjoyable.

I recall reading this with my mother many years ago. The superstitious but cunning Louis XI and the proud and foolish bishop (of Beauvais) stay in my mind more than Quentin himself.